WO2021261694A1

WO2021261694A1 - Input device for transmitting touch input

Info

Publication number: WO2021261694A1
Application number: PCT/KR2021/000171
Authority: WO
Inventors: 고재용
Original assignee: 모션퀸 주식회사
Priority date: 2020-06-21
Filing date: 2021-01-07
Publication date: 2021-12-30

Abstract

Disclosed is an input device for transmitting a touch input. An input device for an electronic device according to one embodiment of the present disclosure comprises: an operation unit which provides a touch input to an electronic device as a result of any one of a plurality of touch contact points contacting a touch screen of the electronic device by means of a movement induced by a user; and a fixing unit which is fixed to the electronic device and provides feedback to the operation unit to counteract the movement induced by the user. The plurality of touch contact points do not contact the touch screen in a state in which there is no movement induced by the user, and as the operation unit deviates from a reference position due to the movement, any one of the plurality of touch contact points contacts the touch screen from the outside of the fixing unit.

Description

Input devices that pass touch input

The present disclosure relates to an input device transmitting a touch input, and more particularly, to an input device for an electronic device transmitting a touch input.

Recently, as portable electronic devices such as smart phones, smart pads, and tablet computers increase, user demands for intuitive input/output methods are increasing. For portable electronic devices, portability has always been an important issue. The size of electronic devices is limited for portability, and as a result, the size of a touch screen that displays information and receives a touch input from a user is relatively small compared to a general TV or monitor. Due to the limitation of the size of the touch screen, for ease of portability of the electronic device, the user may experience inconvenience of input to the electronic device, for example, a part of the screen may be covered with a finger, inability to receive tactile feedback for operation of the joystick, etc. A number of inconveniences have to be endured.

An input device for an electronic device according to an embodiment of the present disclosure includes: a fixing unit mounted on the electronic device to fix the input device to the electronic device; a first bar having one end fixed to the fixing unit and having a length greater than or equal to a critical length; a second bar having one end connected to the other end of the first bar and having a length greater than or equal to the critical length; a third bar having one end connected to the middle of the first bar and having less than the critical length; and a fourth bar having one end connected to the other end of the third bar and the other end connected to the middle of the second bar, the fourth bar having less than the critical length, the other end of the second bar and the other end of the third bar and the fourth bar Any one of the connecting ends is a gripping part whose movement is controlled by the user, and the other end of the second bar and the other of the connecting ends of the third bar and the fourth bar are brought into contact with the touch screen of the electronic device and the user It is a touch contact that transmits a touch input according to the movement by

According to an embodiment, in the input device for the electronic device, the gripper may be positioned outside the touch screen of the electronic device, and the touch contact may be positioned on the touch screen of the electronic device.

According to an embodiment, in an input device for an electronic device, a first magnetic body is fixed to a connection end of the third bar and the fourth bar, a second magnetic body is fixed to a rear surface of the electronic device, and the first magnetic body and the When there is no movement of the connecting end by the user due to the attractive force between the second magnetic bodies, a central regression characteristic to be located at a reference position may occur.

According to an embodiment, in the input device for the electronic device, the first bar, the second bar, the third bar, and the fourth bar may be located on a side of the electronic device on which the touch screen is disposed.

According to an embodiment, in the input device for the electronic device, the first bar is located on a side where the touch screen of the electronic device is not disposed, and the second bar, the third bar, and the fourth bar are the electronic device A connection point located on a side on which the touch screen is disposed and connecting each of the second bar and the third bar to the first bar may have a length greater than a thickness of the electronic device.

According to an embodiment, in the input device for the electronic device, one end of the first bar, the other end of the second bar, and the connecting end of the third bar and the fourth bar may be located on an imaginary straight line.

According to an embodiment, the touch screen may correspond to a capacitive touch screen, and may be formed of a conductive material from the grip part to the touch contact point.

According to various embodiments of the present disclosure, a low-cost accessory including only a simple device without additional sensors, circuits, and communication modules for a computing device having at least one of a touch screen and a magnetic field measurement sensor, such as a smartphone or tablet You can effectively perform input using .

According to various embodiments of the present disclosure, in order to input motion to the portable computer, a touch screen already provided in the portable computer is used, and the accessory uses a simple magnet or touch screen input without any electronic sensor, circuit, or power supply. You can conveniently operate geospatial applications such as graphic editors, motion games, street views and google earth by inputting intuitive motions, which are various user inputs, into computer software through accessories equipped only with touch contacts, and changing the state of objects on the software. .

The effects of the present disclosure are not limited to the effects mentioned above, and other effects not mentioned will be clearly understood by those skilled in the art from the description of the claims.

1 to 11 are diagrams for explaining a pantograph-based input device according to an embodiment of the present disclosure.

Hereinafter, specific contents for carrying out the present disclosure will be described in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings. However, in the following description, if there is a risk of unnecessarily obscuring the gist of the present disclosure, detailed descriptions of well-known functions or configurations will be omitted.

In the accompanying drawings, the same or corresponding components are assigned the same reference numerals. In addition, in the description of the embodiments below, overlapping description of the same or corresponding components may be omitted. However, even if descriptions regarding components are omitted, it is not intended that such components are not included in any embodiment.

Terms used in the present disclosure will be briefly described, and the disclosed embodiments will be described in detail. The terms used in this specification have been selected as currently widely used general terms as possible while considering the functions in the present disclosure, but these may vary depending on the intention or precedent of a person skilled in the art, the emergence of new technology, and the like. In addition, in a specific case, there is a term arbitrarily selected by the applicant, and in this case, the meaning will be described in detail in the description of the corresponding invention. Therefore, the terms used in the present disclosure should be defined based on the meaning of the term and the contents of the present disclosure, rather than the simple name of the term.

In this disclosure, expressions in the singular include plural expressions unless the context clearly dictates the singular. Also, the plural expression includes the singular expression unless the context clearly dictates the plural.

In the present disclosure, when a part includes a certain component, it means that other components may be further included, rather than excluding other components, unless otherwise stated.

In the present disclosure, the upper side of a drawing may be referred to as "upper" or "upper side", and the lower side thereof may be referred to as "lower side" or "lower side" of the configuration shown in the drawing. In addition, in the drawings, a portion between the upper part and the lower part or the part other than the upper part and the lower part of the illustrated configuration may be referred to as a “side” or a “side”. Relative terms such as “upper” and “upper” may be used to describe the relationship between the components shown in the drawings, and the present disclosure is not limited by such terms.

In the present disclosure, a direction toward the inner space of a structure may be referred to as “inside”, and a direction protruding into the open outer space may be referred to as “outside”. Relative terms such as “inside” and “outside” may be used to describe the relationship between the components shown in the drawings, and the present disclosure is not limited by such terms.

Reference to “A and/or B” in this disclosure means A, or B, or A and B.

In the present disclosure, when it is said that a certain part is connected to another part, it includes not only a case in which it is directly connected, but also a case in which it is connected through another configuration in the middle.

Advantages and features of the disclosed embodiments, and methods of achieving them, will become apparent with reference to the embodiments described below in conjunction with the accompanying drawings. However, the present disclosure is not limited to the embodiments disclosed below, but may be implemented in various different forms, and only the present embodiments allow the present disclosure to be complete, and the present disclosure provides those skilled in the art with the scope of the invention. It is provided for complete information only.

Referring to FIG. 1 , an electronic device 110 for explaining an environment in which an input device according to an embodiment is mounted is shown. The electronic device 110 is a device controlled by a user, and may include, for example, various computing devices such as a smart phone, a tablet, a laptop, and a personal computer.

In an embodiment, the electronic device 110 may display the currently played game screen and the virtual joystick 120 in the lower left corner on the touch screen. The virtual joystick 120 is touched by a user's finger and then dragged in any one direction, such as up, down, left, and right, so that a character in the game can be controlled. However, when the virtual joystick 120 is controlled with a finger, the screen is covered by the user's hand, tactile feedback cannot be provided for manipulation of the virtual joystick 120 , and the user's finger directly touches the electronic device 110 . Fatigue due to heat or friction generated in the electronic device 110 by contact may be accumulated, and an input device for solving this may be used by being mounted on the electronic device 110 . Such an input device will be described in detail with reference to the drawings.

Referring to FIG. 2 , an example for explaining the pantograph principle applied to the input device according to an embodiment is shown. The pantograph shows that the four bars shown in FIG. 2 (eg, the first bar AP, the second bar TA, the third bar BF, the fourth bar CF) are connected to the connection points A, C, F, B. They are connected to form a quadrangle (especially, in many cases, a parallelogram) ACFB, and two bars (ie, the first bar AP and the second bar AT) may have a structure that more protrudes out of the quadrangle. When one of the ends of the bar, P, is fixed and either T or F is moved, the other can move in parallel at a predetermined distance ratio. If the inner quadrangle ACFB is a parallelogram and the TFP is controlled to be positioned on a single straight line, the trajectories of F and T will be exactly enlarged/reduced similarities. Even in a structure where these conditions are not completely satisfied, T and F draw trajectories that are quite similar even if they are not exactly similar.

In the present invention, an input device (eg, a joystick) in which the touch screen is not covered by the user's hand may be proposed using such a pantograph. The input device consists of four bars and connection points as in the pantograph shown in FIG. 2 , in which one of T and F of the pantograph is a grip part pushed by the user's finger, and the other one causes a touch input to the touch screen. It can be a touch contact.

For example, when the touch screen is capacitive, the touch contact must have conductivity, and T and F are connected with a conductive material, so that a touch can occur by connecting from the hand to the touch screen with a conductive material. As another example, when the touch screen is a static pressure type, the contact may be formed of various shapes and materials that press the touch screen to generate pressure. In this case, since the grip part is disposed on the outside of the touch screen, the touch screen may not be covered by the user's hand controlling the grip part. In addition, if the gripper is pressed with a finger, the touch contact may come into contact with the touch screen by the pressing force, and if the finger is removed from the gripping portion, the touch contact may also be separated from the touch screen. This can be easily implemented by using an elastic member such as a spring or silicone, or a magnetic material having attractive or repulsive force.

Referring to FIG. 3 , an input device according to an exemplary embodiment is illustrated. The symbols shown in FIG. 3 may be the same as those described in FIG. 2 , but the structure may be opposite to that of FIG. 2 . In the input device of FIG. 3 , the user may move the gripping part F by sliding it with a finger. The touch contact T moves in parallel to the gripper F and provides a touch input (eg, touch move input) to the touch screen, and the lower end of the touch contact T may be made of conductive silicone, etc. . The fixing part P may be fixed to the attachment frame. The attachment frame may be configured in a 'C' shape including an upper arm and a lower arm that are attached to and fixed to the electronic device. Through this structure, the fixing part P may be fixed to the electronic device.

A moving magnet (or ferromagnetic material) may be disposed at the lower end of the gripper F, and a fixed magnet (or ferromagnetic material) may be disposed behind the corresponding attachment frame. An attractive force is generated between the moving magnet and the fixed magnet, and when the user pushes the gripper F, the gripper F transmits a force to return to the center of the joystick to the user's finger, thereby generating tactile feedback. In this way, the central regression characteristic can be generated using magnetic materials that generate attractive force between specific positions of an electronic device or an object fixed to the electronic device, such as the gripper F and the attachment frame, but in addition, elastic members such as silicon and springs are used. A central regression feature may be implemented.

FIG. 4 shows an example in which the input device described with reference to FIG. 3 is mounted on the electronic device, and FIG. 5 shows an example of controlling a virtual joystick through the input device mounted on the electronic device. As described above, the gripper F is located outside the touch screen of the electronic device, and the touch contact T is located on the virtual joystick displayed on the touch screen, so that the joystick can be controlled without blocking the game screen displayed on the touch screen. . For example, when the grip part F on the outside of the touch screen is slid by a user's finger, a touch input may be generated on a virtual joystick on which a touch contact T positioned on the touch screen is displayed.

6 , an input device according to another exemplary embodiment is illustrated. The input device of FIG. 6 is also a device using the pantograph described with reference to FIG. 2 , and includes an attachment frame for fixing to the input device and the electronic device described with reference to FIG. 3 , a gripper whose movement is controlled by a user's finger, and an image on the touch screen of the electronic device It is common to have a touch contact located at , but there are the following differences.

First, the fixing part P may be disposed on the rear surface of the attachment frame, so that the first bar AP may also be fixed to the rear surface of the attachment frame, that is, the rear surface of the electronic device. This may imply that the fixing part P is installed in an area corresponding to the touch screen.

In addition, in the case of the input device described with reference to FIG. 3 , F is a gripping part and T is a touch contact. In the input device of FIG. 6 , F corresponds to a touch contact and T corresponds to a gripping part. Accordingly, the size of the movement of the touch contact F may be reduced compared to the movement of the gripper T.

In addition, while the first bar AP is fixed to the back side of the electronic device, in order for the touch contact point F to provide a touch input to the touch screen on the front side of the electronic device, the connection points A and B between the first bar AP and the other bars have a height of at least a certain length. can have For example, the connection points A and B have lengths longer than the thickness of the electronic device, so that even if the first bar AP is disposed on the back side of the electronic device, the touch contact point F may contact the touch screen on the front side of the electronic device. In FIG. 10 , the lengths of the connection points A and B can be easily checked.

FIG. 7 is an example of the input device of FIG. 6 viewed from the rear.

Referring to FIG. 8 , an example in which an input device according to an embodiment is mounted on an electronic device is illustrated. An upper arm and a lower arm of the attachment frame may be mounted on a side surface of the electronic device to fix the input device to the electronic device. FIG. 8 may show the input device fixed to the electronic device from the front part, and FIG. 9 may show the input device fixed to the electronic device from the rear part.

Referring to FIG. 10 , in order to generate a central regression characteristic according to an embodiment, that is, when no force is applied to the grip part of the input device, it returns to a known reference position, and when the grip part is pushed with a finger, the corresponding reference A plurality of magnetic materials may be used to generate a force to return to position (ie, tactile feedback). In the case of the input device described with reference to FIGS. 6 to 10 , the portion where the central regression characteristic is generated may not be the grip part T but the touch contact F. That is, a moving magnet (or ferromagnetic material) may be disposed on the moving touch contact F, and a fixed magnet (or ferromagnetic material) fixed to the rear surface of the electronic device may be disposed. Due to the attractive force between the moving magnet and the fixed magnet, the touch contact F may have a central regression characteristic to return to a previously known reference position.

Referring to FIG. 11 , an example in which the gripper F according to an embodiment is implemented in the folding method (b) rather than the sliding method (a) described above is illustrated. In other words, by putting the axis or pivot of the stick-type structure to be bent on the attachment frame, the gripper F (T in another example) slides in the direction that the user bends the stick-type structure, It may be driven in the same manner as the input device described with reference to FIGS. 3 to 10 .

The above-described preferred embodiments of the present invention have been disclosed for purposes of illustration, and various modifications, changes and additions will be possible within the spirit and scope of the present invention by those skilled in the art having ordinary knowledge of the present invention, and such modifications, changes and additions should be considered to be within the scope of the claims.

Those of ordinary skill in the art to which the present invention pertains, within the scope of not departing from the technical spirit of the present invention, various substitutions, modifications and changes are possible, so the present invention is described in the above-described embodiments and the accompanying drawings. not limited by

Claims

An input device for an electronic device, comprising:

a fixing part mounted on the electronic device to fix the input device to the electronic device;

a first bar having one end fixed to the fixing unit and having a length greater than or equal to a critical length;

a second bar having one end connected to the other end of the first bar and having a length greater than or equal to the critical length;

a third bar having one end connected to the middle of the first bar and having less than the critical length; and

A fourth bar shorter than the critical length having one end connected to the other end of the third bar and the other end connected to the middle of the second bar

including,

Any one of the other end of the second bar and the connecting end of the third bar and the fourth bar is a holding unit whose movement is controlled by a user,

The other end of the second bar and the other one of the connecting end of the third bar and the fourth bar are in contact with the touch screen of the electronic device to be a touch contact that transmits a touch input according to the movement of the user,

input device.
According to claim 1,

The grip part is located outside the touch screen of the electronic device,

The touch contact is located on the touch screen of the electronic device,

input device.
According to claim 1,

A first magnetic body is fixed to the connecting end of the third bar and the fourth bar,

A second magnetic body is fixed to the rear surface of the electronic device,

A central regression characteristic to be located at a reference position occurs when the connecting end is not moved by the user by the attractive force between the first magnetic body and the second magnetic body,

input device.
According to claim 1,

The first bar, the second bar, the third bar, and the fourth bar are located on a side of the electronic device on which the touch screen is disposed.

input device.
According to claim 1,

The first bar is located on a side where the touch screen of the electronic device is not disposed,

The second bar, the third bar, and the fourth bar are located on a side where the touch screen of the electronic device is disposed,

A connection point connecting each of the second bar and the third bar to the first bar has a length greater than a thickness of the electronic device,

input device.
According to claim 1,

One end of the first bar, the other end of the second bar, and the connecting end of the third bar and the fourth bar are located on an imaginary straight line,

input device.
According to claim 1,

The touch screen corresponds to a capacitive touch screen,

formed of a conductive material from the gripping part to the touch contact,

input device.